Kirksville man pleads guilty to stealing thousands from MU fraternity
A 62-year-old Kirksville man pleaded guilty Thursday to embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars from an MU fraternity chapter.
Burt Louis Beard waived his right to a grand jury and pleaded guilty to stealing a total of $380,502 from the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity.
It happened during the last half of Beard’s time serving as volunteer treasurer between March 2008 and August 2014. In his role with SAE, Beard was responsible for financial duties related to maintaining the house, paying various vendors and collecting rent checks.
According to the judgment, Beard wrote himself more than 150 checks claiming they were for reimbursement of personal loans to SAE for direct payments he made to vendors.
Beard’s attorney, J.R. Hobbs, told ABC 17 News that Beard regretted his actions and accepted full responsibility for what happened.
A new treasurer took over the SAE chapter in 2014, according to the plea agreement in the case, and flagged the activity after reviewing Beard’s records. Beard had written several checks to himself, the agreement said, and the new treasurer handed the records off the a forensic accounting team to review years worth of payments Beard had made to himself and others.
Beard claimed that on several occasions, he used his own money to pay companies for work at SAE, then use the fraternity’s funds to reimburse himself. The accounting firm’s work showed that many companies either never did work at SAE or had different rec
The time period of Beard’s actions came while SAE was no longer affiliated with the University of Missouri. The school withdrew its recognition of SAE as a student organization for four years that year due to three separate conduct and IFC violations. Those included having alcohol in the chapter house and violating “IFC Scholarship Policy,” all while on a school-issued probation for previous violations.
The plea agreement said Beard credited this withdrawal of recognition to justify his actions. Some companies didn’t believe SAE had the money, causing him to pay for some things out of his pocket.
“Beard claimed he was a sloppy bookkeeper, and did not keep track of the amounts he paid on behalf of SAE,” the plea agreement said.
Beard could be sentenced to serve up to 30 years without parole in federal prison.
